altruism

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   Unselfish concern for the welfare and happiness of other people.

   Her decision to donate a kidney to a stranger was an act of pure altruism.

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Simplified etymology

Altruism entered English in the mid-19th century from a French term coined by Auguste Comte on the model of egotism. The French formation was based on altrui, meaning “somebody else,” which comes from the Latin phrase alteri huic, “to this other,” and is related to Latin alter, “other.”

From French altruisme, which was coined in 1830 by Auguste Comte from autrui (“of or to others”) + -isme, from Old French, from Latin alteri, dative of alter (“other”) (whence also English alter). Apparently inspired by the French Latin legal phrase l'autrui, from le bien, le droit d'autrui (“the good, the right of the other”). Introduced into English by George Henry Lewes in 1853, in his translation Comte’s Philosophy of the Sciences, 1, xxi.

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